Derailed but not defeated, managed to hop onto the last flight of the evening, NYC, back of the plane, but at least I'm over the ocean. Of course plenty of 24 hour temptations to resist.... Now in the waiting lounge at La Guardia... what a trip...

01. The Loved Ones02. ...And In Every Home - including Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds03. Accidents Will Happen04. You'll Never Be A Man05. Tears Before Bedtime06. Moods For Moderns07. Shabby Doll08. Human Hands09. Green Shirt10. Poor Napoleon11. Watching The Detectives12. The Long Honeymoon13. This House Is Empty Now14. King Horse15. You Little Fool16. Pidgin EnglishEncore 117. Alison18. A Face In The Crowd19. This Year's Girl20. All Grown Up21. Stripping Paper22. Almost Blue23. Kid About It24. Beyond Belief25. Man Out Of TimeEncore 226. Town Cryer27. Everyday I Write The Book28. Pump It Up29. (What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love And Understanding?

Pretty good show, marred by endless stream of people coming down the aisle to take pictures and then keep standing in the aisle if they could. Security made a half hearted effort for a while to keep the aisle clear but then gave up. Eventually made the aisle seat I picked out for my wife rather pointless.

Cool to see This Years Girl done with Steve, the US premiere (I think) of Stripping Paper, and Poor Napoleon, one of my all time faves.

FAVEHOUR wrote:Yes they were selling both Lupe O Tone singles at the show.

Pretty good show, marred by endless stream of people coming down the aisle to take pictures and then keep standing in the aisle if they could. Security made a half hearted effort for a while to keep the aisle clear but then gave up. Eventually made the aisle seat I picked out for my wife rather pointless.

Cool to see This Years Girl done with Steve, the US premiere (I think) of Stripping Paper, and Poor Napoleon, one of my all time faves.

thanks for all that good news (EXCEPT FOR THE ANNOYING CROWD report!!) yes, would love to hear a band NAPOLEON once again and the duet TYGIRL sounds intriguing. are you going to any more shows this month Dave?

Elvis Costello Took a Return Trip through ‘Imperial Bedroom’ at the Riverside

While most artists in Elvis Costello’s shoes by now would have whittled their set lists down to a knockout 95 minutes of hits and fan favorites, coasting on easy paychecks and even easier applause, Costello has taken the harder route. Always one to shake things up, for his latest tour he’s celebrating the 35th anniversary of Imperial Bedroom, the critically adored record that broke from his usual rock ’n’ roll and revealed the scope of his compositional ambitions, luxuriating instead in the soft tones and slow tempos of jazz and orchestral pop.

It’s an odd album to tour behind since, loved as it is, it’s not exactly a party starter—even its biggest defenders would admit that it has a tendency to drag. He had a workaround for that, though. Instead of playing the album in its entirety Sunday night at the Riverside Theater, he put it on shuffle, alongside numbers from his songbook both expected (“Alison” and “Watching The Detectives”) and not (most of the set, really). At times it felt less like the “Imperial Bedroom Tour” and more like the “Mellower Songs I Don’t Usually Get To Play Live Tour,” detouring frequently for deep cuts like “Poor Napoleon,” leisure jams like “Every Day I Write The Book,” and Bacharachian ballads (including one he actually wrote with Burt Bacharach, “This House is Empty Now.”)

For most of the show, Costello and his backing band, the Imposters, were joined by two powerhouse backing soul singers who injected some extra energy into the songs but sometimes had a tendency to overpower an already often very busy mix (did anybody expect an Imperial Bedroom-heavy show to be this loud?) Some of the set’s most memorable moments offered relief from that volume, scaling the stage down to just Costello and his longtime pianist Steve Nieve, who accompanied him on a couple of torchy new songs—“A Face in the Crowd” and “Stripping Paper.”

At nearly two-and-a-half hours long, the show was almost too generous, and some of Imperial Bedroom’s lesser numbers began to bleed together (there’s a reason “Pidgin English” and “Town Cryer” never became staples of his live shows). At the end of the night, after 26 songs and two encores, Costello ended the night with the two big crowd-pleasers it seemed as if he might skip: “Pump It Up” and “(What’s So Funny ’Bout) Peace, Love & Understanding”—a little tease of the livelier, safer show he could have performed instead.

Since you put me down, it seems i've been very gloomy. You may laugh but pretty girls look right through me.

At nearly two-and-a-half hours long, the show was almost too generous, and some of Imperial Bedroom’s lesser numbers began to bleed together (there’s a reason “Pidgin English” and “Town Cryer” never became staples of his live shows). At the end of the night, after 26 songs and two encores, Costello ended the night with the two big crowd-pleasers it seemed as if he might skip: “Pump It Up” and “(What’s So Funny ’Bout) Peace, Love & Understanding”—a little tease of the livelier, safer show he could have performed instead.

Those are two of my favorite songs on the album, and when I saw Town Cryer performed at the Spinning Songbook show in NYC,I thought that Elvis really should keep that in his permanent performing repertoire. And I thought Pidgin English was such a great main set closer to this tour. Really, lots of energy and momentum. To each his own, I guess...

Really love that. shows the melancholy (sadness? sympathy?) of the song that can get hidden under the bluster of the way it is often performed. he's not ironically mocking this year's girl but almost pleading with her to wake up.

I've long wondered: I assume (maybe incorrectly) that the live videos on this forum are, at least mostly, uploaded by members. But maybe not....cuz it always seems it's the same old greatest hits (Alison, Detectives, PIU, PLU, etc.) that get featured. I'd think that people like "us" (i.e., people who are registered here) would choose rarer, more interesting tracks (say, from this tour: Poor Napoleon, Still Have That Other Girl, All Grown Up, Stripping Paper, Talking in the Dark, Sneaky Feelings, You'll Never Be a Man....) to upload.